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JOHANNESBURG, 8 July 2008 (IRIN) - A rough guide to why food prices keep going up

What is the crisis?

For the first time since 1973, the world has been hit by a combination of record high food and fuel prices. The price of oilseeds and grains, such as wheat and maize, has doubled since January 2006, with over 60 percent of the hike taking place since January 2008, according to the World Bank. Rice more than tripled between January and May 2008.

Prices have begun to fall as the 2008 crop is being harvested, but recent floods in US states producing maize and soya-beans, and poor weather conditions in Australia have slowed the decline.

Since 2001, oil has rocketed from US$20 a barrel to an unprecedented $140. The World Bank says oil prices are now higher than any time in the last century, not only pushing up the price of food in poor countries importing staple grains and fuel, but also eroding their capacity to buy food.

Why have prices shot up suddenly?

The short answer is that global cereal stocks have not kept pace with growing demand, and neither has the oil supply. Stocks of cereals have been declining worldwide since 2000, while demand has been increasing at two to three percent per year.

In the last two years, cereal stocks have fallen to levels last seen in the 1970s for two main reasons: firstly, major wheat-producing countries such as Australia suffered droughts in 2006 and 2007; secondly, the hike in fuel prices saw the US and many European countries offer subsidies to their farmers to grow grain for biofuel. The switch from growing food to growing fuel pushed up prices by 30 to 70 percent, depending on which study you read.

Some analysts have blamed high food prices on the burgeoning economies of China, India and some countries in sub-Saharan Africa, where more people can now afford to include meat and other animal products in their diet, which in turn has driven up the demand for grains used as feed.

However, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) says recent high commodity prices do not seem to have originated in these emerging markets: neither China nor India are big cereal importers in the 2007/08 season. In fact, China is exporting maize and India's wheat imports are relatively small.

Various food analysts say the production of grains has dropped because of rising chemical fertiliser prices, which have doubled and even tripled in some parts of the world, making it unaffordable to most farmers in developing countries.

Other analysts have attributed low cereal stocks to the cumulative effect of changes in the agricultural policies of developed countries, particularly in Europe, where farm subsidies have been shrinking, and a drop in investment in agricultural research to develop high-yield varieties since the 1990s.

But the price spikes recorded in 2008, particularly in rice, have been linked to export restrictions imposed by rice-producing countries, including India, China, Vietnam, Cambodia and Egypt, which together supplied around 40 percent of global rice exports in 2007, according to the International Monetary Fund.

Didn't anyone see the crisis coming?

Since 2006 the FAO has warned of a possible food price crisis in its periodic updates on global cereal stocks.

What has been the fallout of the crisis?

The impact of increasingly expensive food has been wide-ranging,deepening poverty levels and pushing even more people into poverty. According to a recent World Bank study, at least another 105 million across the world will become poor.

Simulations in this study suggest that in Africa alone nearly another 30 million people will fall into poverty: in Sierra Leone the food crisis has raised poverty by three percentage points, to 69 percent; in Djibouti, rising food prices over the past three years are estimated to have increased extreme poverty from 40 percent to 54 percent.

Various UN agencies have warned that unaffordable food could drive up the number of undernourished people in the world – already at 800 million - while poor people have begun skipping meals or switching to cheaper and lower quality cereals, affecting their health.

A recent FAO assessment in Somalia found that 2.6 million people - approximately 35 percent of the population, of which more than half are children - had been affected by a nutrition crisis caused by drought and prolonged conflict. The number of people needing humanitarian assistance in Somalia could reach an estimated 3.5 million - half the total population - by the end of 2008.

According to the World Bank, even stable, high-growth countries are not immune to the damaging effects of escalating food prices on child nutrition. In India, for instance, 47 percent of children are stunted – double the rate in sub-Saharan Africa, where 24 percent experience delayed development - and nearly five times that of China, where just over nine percent of children are stunted.

The UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) says 1.5 to 1.8 million more children in India are at risk of malnourishment as households cut back on meals or switch to less nutritious foods to cope with rising prices.

Expensive food and fuel have also had political fallout: since 2007, high prices have sparked violent protests in at least 17 countries, mostly in Africa; earlier in 2008, the government of Haiti fell after week-long protests.

The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), which is committed to promoting democracy and assisting developing countries, noted that each 10 percent increase in the prices of cereals adds nearly $4.5 billion to the import bills of poorer countries.

An FAO study recently noted that at least seven countries - Gambia, Liberia, Mauritania, Niger, Zimbabwe, Jordan and Moldova - which have all chalked up high levels of debt - could be forced to spend as much as two percent of their gross domestic product on importing food. Most of these countries are already struggling with chronic hunger, so soaring food costs hold the threat of political instability.

Surely higher food prices benefit small-scale farmers?

Yes, logically they should. But very few subsistence farmers in Africa produce surplus food, and are mostly net buyers. Simulated studies by FAO found that rural households in countries where land was not equitably distributed - which is the case in most developing countries - would be worst affected.

The World Bank has also found that although farmers who produce surplus food might be better protected, even they might not benefit from the food price surge because the cost of inputs like fuel, fertiliser and transportation often rose faster than world market prices for food.

Agriculture experts say that unless governments subsidise inputs, poverty levels in rural households could deepen, and the prospects for beefing up global cereal stocks look bleak. The World Bank has called for subsidies aimed at poor and small-scale farmers for a limited period to boost yields, as part of a package that should include investment in extension, research and rural infrastructure.

When will food prices come down?

High prices may boost production in 2008, which in turn may push down prices, provided there are no natural disasters. But any major expansion of agricultural land in the short term is unlikely, says FAO, and any increase in plantings of one crop would need to occur at the expense of another. So, while the price of a certain food commodity might fall, the prices of others might increase.


Photo: Lynn Maung/IRIN
Billions of dollars needed for a second Green Revolution
Short-term price forecasts for food commodities are difficult because they are linked to other markets, such as energy. A recent FAO/OECD medium-term outlook for major agricultural commodities said prices were likely to remain high for the next decade.

Can the situation be turned around?

Many agriculture experts are pushing for a new "Green Revolution", which doubled cereal production between 1970 and 1995 in South Asia. Money and investment in developing high-yielding varieties of maize, wheat and rice, combined with access to pesticides, irrigation and fertiliser, could have a dramatic impact.

But this would require huge amounts of money: between $15 and $20 billion a year, according to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

Aid agencies and other non-governmental organisations are lobbying the G8 and other leaders meeting in Japan this week to beef up investment in agriculture in developing countries.

jk/he

Themes: (IRIN) Food Security, (IRIN) Governance, (IRIN) Health & Nutrition

[ENDS]
Report can be found online at:
http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=79148

[This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

GLOBAL: Humanitarians cool on G8 summit response to food crisis

Cereals for sale in the central market of Kabul, Afghanistan. Due to high food prices, most people cannot afford regular daily meals
NEW YORK, 11 July 2008 (IRIN) - When the leaders of the US, UK, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, opened their meeting in Japan on 7 July, World Bank President Robert Zoellick urged them to “seize this opportunity” in the face of a crisis that threatened to push 100 million or more additional people into hunger beyond the 850 million already suffering.

He called for “resources, action, and results in real time” in three areas - meeting immediate needs with safety net support; giving small farmers, especially in Africa, access to seeds, fertilisers and other basic inputs; and easing export bans and restrictions that have contributed to higher prices.

“The G8 did not rise to the challenge laid down by President Zoellick and others,” Oxfam policy director Gawain Kripke told IRIN. The World Bank had no immediate comment.
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“As far as I can tell there’s no new money or substantive commitment … Zoellick was calling for action not words, so there seems to be quite a mismatch between his call and what the G8 did,” Kripke said.

“It’s not impressive, it’s not much of an advance on the state of play … they should have been more specific about where assistance should come from and how much it should be. There should have been a bit more introspection among the G8 about the role of G8 country polices in contributing to the crisis, namely agricultural policy, biofuels policy.”

Zoellick said in a statement: “We believe they recognise the danger [of the crisis]. No one has objected - and many support - our proposal to end export bans on WFP [UN World Food Programme] purchases.” Before the summit he had called on governments around the world to ensure access to local purchases for the WFP, and said it was “an outrage” that such purchases were not now exempt from export restrictions.



The Syrian finance minister has said withdrawing bread subsidies is a “red line”, but failing harvests and soaring international wheat prices may force a re-think
WFP Executive Director Josette Sheeran welcomed the leaders’ “resolve” to help protect the poorest and find long-term solutions to the crisis. But, she stressed in a statement: “We need to follow through with practical measures that can make a real difference in addressing urgent hunger needs throughout the world.”

The summit pledged to “ensure the compatibility of policies for the sustainable production and use of biofuels with food security and accelerate development and commercialisation of sustainable second-generation biofuels from non-food plant materials and inedible biomass”.

Missing details

But like much else in the statement there were no concrete details or figures, though the leaders did note that since January they had committed, for short-, medium- and long-term purposes, more than US$10 billion to support food aid, nutrition interventions, social protection activities and measures to increase agricultural output in affected countries.

They called for the removal of export restrictions, and pledged to reverse the overall decline of aid and investment in the agricultural sector, and to achieve significant increases in support of developing country initiatives, particularly in Africa. But, as with other pledges, there were no details.

“There is no concrete proposal for lasting solutions to the global food price crisis,” said the G8 NGO Platform Network, which groups 1,500 humanitarian and development NGOs in the eight countries.

“The impact of biofuel policies in developed countries on this crisis was not acknowledged. In addition, the G8 made only a vague commitment to ‘reverse the overall decline of aid and investment in the agricultural sector’,” it added in a statement.

“Unfortunately, the 2008 Hokkaido Summit produced no significant breakthroughs and failed to meet the expectations of firmer and more comprehensive commitments to end extreme poverty and protect the environment.”



Rioters took to the streets in Burkina Faso's second city, Bobo-Dioulasso, in February 2008 protesting against rising food and fuel prices
But it did applaud the $10 billion contribution, which does not appear to contain any new money, and the pledge to build up local agriculture by promoting local purchase of food aid.

Action Against Hunger called for immediate action. “We are hoping for more than promises or long-term plans that are doomed to fail. We aren’t as optimistic about the prospects for immediate solutions stemming from the recent G8 meetings,” security adviser Ilke Pietzsch told IRIN.

Distortions

However, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) research fellow Marc Cohen said the summit had made some progress towards meeting Zoellick’s challenge.

“They did put this high on their agenda, probably the highest it’s been since they started having the summits in the 1970s, to talk about hunger and food insecurity,” he told IRIN. “So I think that’s positive. And the endorsement of the UN framework for addressing this was important, to get the richest countries behind that.”

But he noted that they had not really said anything about revisiting mandates in the US and European Union, which set aside quotas for biofuel production from food crops.

They also failed to pledge to reduce their own trade-distorting subsidies and barriers even as they called on others not to take measures such as export embargoes. “That’s a major missing piece here,” he said. “Our [US] own trade policies are part of the problem.”

The leaders tasked an Experts Group to monitor the implementation of their commitments. Zoellick welcomed this as useful in helping to ensure accountability.
But in the view of some, the group would not be overworked. “There are very few commitments so it’s not going to be hard to monitor them,” said Oxfam’s Kripke.

ma/am/mw

Themes: (IRIN) Aid Policy, (IRIN) Economy, (IRIN) Food Security, (IRIN) Health & Nutrition

[ENDS]
Report can be found online at:
http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=79205

[This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]
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Memo from Dakar

June 18, 2008
Memo From Dakar
Shadows Grow Across One of Africa’s Bright Lights
By LYDIA POLGREEN

DAKAR, Senegal — From the air, this sprawling city looks like a metropolis on the move, a buzzing quadrilateral jutting into the Atlantic. Cars speed along a supple, newly reconstructed four-lane highway that hugs the rugged coastline. Cranes dot the seaside, building luxury hotels and conference centers, as investors from Dubai revamp the city’s port, hoping to transform it into a high-tech regional hub.

But on the ground the picture shifts. Jobless young men line the new highways, trying to scratch out a living by selling phone cards, cashews and Chinese-made calculators to passers-by. The port is full of imported food that is increasingly out of reach for most Senegalese.

Dakar will soon have a glut of five-star hotel rooms, but rising rents have pushed the city’s poor and even middle-class residents into filthy, flood-prone slums. Shortages of fuel mean daily blackouts.

It is hard to escape a sense of malaise that has settled over Senegal, one of Africa’s most stable and admired countries, a miasma of political, economic and social problems as unmistakable as the fine dust that blows in from the Sahara every winter, blotting out the sun with an ashy haze.

This month the sense of crisis reached a head, when a coalition of political and civic groups began a national conference to reassess the country’s direction. The government, seeing it as a provocation, refused to participate.

All of which raises the question: If hardship and tension are vexing Senegal — a former French colony that has never known a coup d’état or military rule, and for 48 years has been one of the most stable, peaceful and enduring democracies in a region so long beset by tyranny and strife — what could that mean for its more troubled neighbors?

This question has become all the more pressing with the implosion of Kenya, once East Africa’s oasis, into ethnically driven electoral violence earlier this year, and South Africa’s recent descent into anti-immigrant rage.

Senegal’s chattering class is increasingly worried that the country’s long run of relatively good luck could also run out.

“After years of sunshine, we have so many clouds gathering over us in Senegal,” said Abdoulaye Bathily, secretary general of Senegal’s Movement for the Labor Party, one of the parties that joined with President Abdoulaye Wade’s coalition in 2000 but have since broken with him. “We are lost, adrift. And if we can’t make it, what country can?”

The political class is in seemingly permanent crisis. The grand coalition of opposition parties that brought Mr. Wade to office in 2000 after 40 years of Socialist rule has collapsed.

Most of the major parties sat out the 2007 legislative elections, so the National Assembly is made up almost exclusively of Mr. Wade’s allies.

A series of squabbles within the governing party, along with the widespread speculation that Mr. Wade is grooming his son, Karim, as his successor, have also soured Senegal’s longstanding reputation as a beacon of democracy in a region once plagued by authoritarianism.

Mr. Wade, an indefatigable octogenarian who was re-elected last year for a five-year term, has in many ways staked his legacy on the rebirth of Dakar from a quaint colonial city to a major regional center, a kind of mini-Dubai for West Africa. It is the bequest of an aging leader to a new generation of Senegalese, the men and women he calls the Generation of Concrete.

Mr. Wade put his son, a former banking executive in London, in charge of organizing the Islamic Summit, a meeting of heads of state of Muslim countries held here in March. The vast makeover of the city was supposed to be complete beforehand, but while most of the roads were finished, the hotels were not. The government rented private homes and cruise ships to house delegates and members of the news media.

Much of the work was paid for by Islamic donors, not the public, but little accounting has been given for the reconstruction projects.

When the speaker of the National Assembly tried to question the president’s son about spending for the summit meeting, the speaker’s party leadership position was abolished and the assembly introduced a bill to cut his term to a single year.

He later reconciled with the president, but such scandals have exacted a toll on the country’s reputation. Once a darling of international donors, who have spent millions to help Senegal build schools and clinics, pay off its debts and plan infrastructure projects, the country has found itself criticized by representatives of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank over public spending and policies that have worsened the effects of rising food prices.

A study commissioned by the United States Agency for International Development last year concluded that “a lack of transparency in public affairs and financial transactions, as well as chronic corruption, plague Senegal today.”

Africa as a whole has been enjoying high economic growth rates, but in 2006 Senegal’s economy grew by just over 2 percent. It has rebounded and is expected to reach 5.4 percent this year, but persistent unemployment and high food and fuel prices have blunted the benefits of growth for most people.

Above all, Senegal’s people seem to have lost their seemingly endless optimism. A Gallup survey completed here last year found that only 29 percent of respondents said they had a job, down from 35 percent the previous year

Most telling, 56 percent of those surveyed said they would leave Senegal permanently if they could. In recent years, tens of thousands of Senegalese have boarded rickety wooden fishing boats to try to sneak into Europe. Many thousands are believed to have died in these perilous crossings.

This frustration has largely been turned against Mr. Wade, a longtime opposition figure who endured imprisonment and political isolation for decades before bringing his quirky blend of neo-liberal and Afro-optimist ideas to the presidential palace.

To his many fans, Mr. Wade is an updated version of the founding fathers who governed Africa in the years immediately after independence. His age is a closely guarded secret, but he is believed to be 82, which would make him almost old enough to have been a contemporary of Africa’s early political giants, like Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana and Julius Nyerere of Tanzania.

El Hadji Amadou Sall, Mr. Wade’s spokesman and a senior adviser, says that the government is already spending most of its budget on sectors that directly affect the poor, like health and schools, but that these are less visible than five-star hotels. Mr. Wade has also announced ambitious plans to boost food production.

Some Senegalese are pleased. Paco Demba Dia, a 39-year-old traditional wrestler, said seeing new roads and buildings gives him a sense of pride.

“In all those years, the Socialists never did anything like this for us,” he said.

But to his critics, Mr. Wade has sullied Senegal’s reputation and has consolidated power within his own family.

The discontent is keenest among young people, and their chosen mouthpieces: rap artists who have become the griots, or musical storytellers, of their generation, providing a soundtrack to their frustrations.

“We’ve been waiting 40 years for real change in this country,” said Didier Awadi, a rapper whose rhymes in the Wolof language demanding change helped steer young people to vote the Socialist Party out of office in 2000. “But we are still waiting.”

On one of the many billboards across the city welcoming the attendees of the Islamic Summit meeting, someone scrawled paint over Mr. Wade’s face, writing: “We are hungry.”

Indeed, many Senegalese wonder whether the money to rebuild the capital was well spent. Amadou Ndiaye, a hawker who sells cheap Chinese-made shoes on the sidewalk, said that little of the new construction will benefit him. He has no car, and the new roads don’t go anywhere near his slum home.

“We can’t eat roads,” Mr. Ndiaye said. “We can’t afford to sleep in five-star hotels. So for whom is all this? Not for the ordinary Senegalese man.”



Copyright 2008 The New York Times Company

Senegal Video

enjoy a cool video on life in Senegal...makes me 'homesick'

Beaten In Silence

DAKAR, 16 June 2008 (IRIN) - One in four women suffers domestic assault and battery in Senegal yet most suffer in silence because of a deeply entrenched culture of impunity and a phlegmatic response from the government, according to experts in the sector.

A study on domestic violence conducted in 2000 by the Canadian Centre of research and International Cooperation (CECI) in Dakar and Kaolack, 150km southeast of the capital, revealed 27.5 percent of women are subject to physical violence from their partners.

Aïssatou (not her real name), 35 and married for ten years, is sitting in the offices of Committee for the Fight Against Violence against Women (CLVF), a non-governmental organisation set up to help domestic violence victims in the Colobane district of Dakar. She is trying to find the words to describe her situation.

"At first, whenever we had an argument my husband would shout and occasionally slap me, then gradually he started to beat me harder,” she said in a frail voice, covering her braided hair with her white veil. "I do not know how long it lasted but I couldn’t take anymore and I eventually went to complain to the police."

She presented the police with a medical certificate as proof of her abuse, but her brother-in-law found out and ordered the police to remove her records from the file. Next time she went to the CLVF listening centre, to relate her story.

According to Fatou Bintou Thioune, CLVF’s only employee, the organisation registered 138 cases like Aïssatou’s between 2005 and 2007, but this represents a fraction of the overall number of cases of domestic violence. “It is happening inside houses all across the city, she told IRIN.

NGOs fill government void

Despite widespread awareness of the problem and commitment in the form of a national campaign a few years ago to address it, no government structure is in place to address these violent incidents, there is no toll-free number for women to report their cases, and no shelter has yet been created for women who flee their homes.

In lieu of government structures to address the problem, 17 women's associations have come together to form a network called Siggil Jigéen, to fight against domestic violence and bring the debate into the public arena. Many of them focus on raising awareness of the issue among communities.

The CLVF, another network of organisations is the only one to have set up listening centres – one in each of Senegal’s eight largest towns - where staff give women psychological counselling and legal and administrative support including on how to proceed with a divorce.

They also offer to mediate in disputes or provide couple counselling. Ndèye Ndiaya Ndoye, vice-president of CLVF says their efforts make a difference but the impact is limited. "Counselling can ease tension, but it does not guarantee the violence will stop. We come to talk to women, to bring them out of their houses and it is a start, but this does not solve the heart of the problem,” she told IRIN.

Impunity despite legislation

In January 1999 a law was passed in the Senegalese penal code punishing domestic violence with a prison sentence ranging from one to five years and a fine of between US$70 and $117. But this law faces religious and cultural resistance according to Fatou Ndiaye who works with Siggil Jigéen.

"The law is poorly enforced," Diouf Nafissatou Mbodj, president of the Association of Women Lawyers of Senegal (AJS).

A former judge to the prosecutor who wished to remain anonymous says judges often do not have a choice - they face pressure from families to minimise the penalties, and there are often limits to what families can pay, given their economic and social reality. "It's very easy for a judge to apply the penalty, but there are many practical obstacles that also have to be taken into account.”

Society encourages silence

Adji Fatou Ndiaye, a coordinator at the UN Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) in Senegal says part of the problem is that people accept domestic violence. ”In Senegal, it is accepted that women are subordinate to men. A woman should always follow a man – her husband, her son, her uncle, or her father - even if his expression of his domination turns violent."

She continued, “There are even religious arguments to legitimise this, and it [violence] is often accepted in families. It is not uncommon to see a mother proud to see her daughters suffer in her marriage, because people can say she has learned to behave in the household."

The result, according to several women who work in the sector, is that too few women dare to admit they are beaten. "When they do, they face enormous pressure from those around them not to," Thioune told IRIN.

Up to 60 percent of domestic violence victims turn to a family member and in three quarters of cases they are told to keep quiet, try to endure it, and find consensus with their spouse, according to CECI’s study.

“I no longer count the number of women who withdraw their complaints or ‘disappear; after having testified,” Thioune said.

Practical obstacles

Women also face practical problems in extricating themselves from their situation. In Senegal the majority of marriages among the 95 percent Muslim population are traditional unions observed in a mosque and not registered by the local authorities according to Thioune.

"The problem is that even when women wish to divorce they are often not able to provide a marriage certificate that would give them this right,” she said.

"It's a vicious circle," she pointed out. "There are so many obstacles to getting out of the marriage that many women drop out of the process, stay in their marriages and tell me they leave it in God’s hands.”

Stigmatise domestic violence

Women working in the sector say the first solution is to enforce existing laws more rigorously.

And they say if the problem is brought out into the open, and people – especially the young - are encouraged to talk about it, it could achieve more of a stigma. They also call on Muslim leaders, Imams, to be brought on board since they are a powerful force in Senegalese society.

By working with these groups the CLVF’s Ndoye hopes to stop the issue from arising in a marriage in the first place. “For when violence has appeared in the household it never completely disappears,” she said.

Turning World's Eyes and Ears to Congo

Turning World's Eyes and Ears to Congo
More Than Four Million Lives Lost in African Country in the Last Decade
GUEST ESSAY By BEN AFFLECK


Over the last year, I have been traveling to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in an effort to learn more about the country.
The actor uses his celebrity to bring attention to Congo's humanitarian crisis.


I view this as a long and ongoing learning experience to educate myself before making any attempt to advocate or "speak out." My plan has been to explore, watch, listen and find those doing the best work with and on behalf of the people of the DRC, in an effort to give exposure to voices which might not otherwise be heard.

In short, I want to listen before speaking and learn before taking action. The "Nightline" segment airing Thursday June, 26 is an attempt to take the viewer along with me in that process.

It makes sense to be skeptical about celebrity activism. There is always the suspicion that involvement with a cause may be doing more good for the spokesman than he or she is doing for the cause.

I welcome any questions about me and my involvement, but I hope you can separate whatever reservations you may have from what is unimpeachably important about this segment: the plight of eastern Congo.

Anyone familiar with the Congo has heard the mind-numbing statistics: more than four million dead since 1998 (and many more before then), the most killed in any conflict since the Second World War. 1,200 people a day are still dying from conflict and conflict-related causes such as starvation and preventable disease.

The country languished as the second worst on the list of failed states until last year, when it bumped up a few notches (though it still ranks below Iraq and Afghanistan on many indices).

The larger war that was fought in Congo included eight countries; regional fighting and violence still continue and instability, impunity and inhumanity are rampant. There are some parts of the country where two out of every three women have been raped.

Children are still widely used as soldiers if they are boys, and as "wives" to militia soldiers if they are girls. The state exerts little authority over much of the eastern part of the country — it is controlled by at least 22 known armed groups. These elements combine to create an environment, in some parts of the country that more closely resembles the movie "Road Warrior" than a properly secured modern state. Bands of militia groups roam freely and each answer only to their own respective leader, living off the population and offering as payment the "Congolese credit card" — the AK-47.

Go to website to watch videos

Ben Affleck's Journey Through the Congo

By KATIE ESCHERICH
June 23, 2008

Actor, writer, producer and director Ben Affleck traveled to Africa's Congo region three times over the last eight months, hoping to understand firsthand one of the world's worst humanitarian crises of this century.

"Nightline" producer Max Culhane and photographer Doug Vogt joined Affleck on his most recent trip to document his journey. Affleck and the "Nightline" team traveled through refugee camps, hospitals and clinics, meeting with warlords, relief workers, child soldiers and members of parliament in an effort to better understand the place where over the last decade more than 4 million people have died in the deadliest conflict since World War II, according to a 2008 report by the International Rescue Committee.

Read more here

Crisis in the Congo- a ABC Nightline Special

Crisis in the Congo

Actor, writer, producer and director Ben Affleck traveled to Africa's Congo region three times over the last eight months, hoping to understand firsthand one of the world's worst humanitarian crises of this century. "Nightline" producer Max Culhane and photographer Doug Vogt joined Affleck on his most recent trip to document his journey. Affleck and the "Nightline" team traveled through refugee camps, hospitals and clinics, meeting with warlords, relief workers, child soldiers and members of parliament in an effort to better understand the place where over the last decade more than 4 million people have died in the deadliest conflict since World War II.
Go to the website for more photo's HERE
This photo shows a Congolese child on the outskirts of Goma.
(Max Culhane/ABC News)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
NEWS RELEASE
Contact Brian Hart/Becky Ogilvie
May 23, 2008
BROWNBACK, DURBIN INTRODUCE CONFLICT MINING BILL
Legislation would require certification of minerals mined inCongo
WASHINGTONU.S.Senators Sam Brownback(R-KS) and Dick Durbin (D-IL) introduced the Conflict Coltan and Cassiterite Act, legislation which would require certification of minerals imported from the Democratic Republic of Congo.
We are witnessing a grave humanitarian crisis in Congo, and we must act now to put an end to the death and suffering, said Brownback. Everyday, Americans use products that have been manufactured using inhumanely mined minerals. The legislation introduced by Senator Durbin and I will bring accountability and transparency to the supply chain of minerals used in the manufacturing of many electronic devices.
Every day inCongo, 1,500 people die as a direct or indirect result of the conflict over the mining of minerals like cassiterite and coltan; to date, the conflict has displaced more than 1.3 million Congolese and has resulted in over 5.4 million deaths.
Without knowing it, tens of millions of people in the United States may be putting money in the pockets of some of the worst human rights violators in the world, simply by using a cell phone or laptop computer, Durbin said. We ought to do all we can to make sure that the products we use and the minerals we import, in no way support those who violate human rights abroad.
The Conflict Coltan and Cassiterite Act requires the President to compile a list of armed groups in the DRC committing serious human rights violations, and prohibits the importation into the U.S. of any product containing columbite-tantalite (coltan) or cassiterite (tin ore) from the DRC if groups on the list would financially benefit.
Approximately 65% of the worlds coltan reserves are located in Congo. Congolese civilians are terrorized and brutalized by warring rebel groups seeking to capitalize on the mining of these minerals. Coltan is commonly used in electronic devices like cell phones, computers, and DVD players.
-30-
Sam Brownback
United States Senator - Kansas
303 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
(202) 224-6521
http://brownback.senate.gov

the DRC through the eyes of a child...

Nice job by this youngster...

Tough Stand By President As Teachers Strike

Tough Stand By President As Teachers Strike

The Nation (Nairobi)

NEWS
11 June 2008
Posted to the web 11 June 2008

By Hamadou Tidiane Sy
Dakar

Senegalese teachers have downed tools demanding better living conditions, higher salaries and research and documentation allowances, but the government is saying it has no resources to increase salaries.

The government claims that the country's teachers are better paid than their colleagues in the west African region, and it claims to spend 40 per cent of the national budget on education.

A Senegalese primary school teacher gets at the beginning of his career roughly FCFA 100,000, (Sh14,632) per month but with the cost of living in Senegal at 24 per cent higher than the African average according to the World Bank, this salary has become meaningless for many teachers.

In reaction to the strike, Senegalese president Abdoulaye Wade decided to split the National Education department into three new ministerial portfolios.

This is the most serious crisis in the education sector since President Wade came to power eight years ago.

The surprise decision came on Monday while the whole nation was wondering if the academic year won't be invalidated due to the repeated teachers' strikes.

The creation of three different ministries to handle the sector was not a welcome move for the teachers who believe this is another ploy by the government to avoid dealing seriously with their demands.

Not an answer

"This is not an answer to the problems. It does not help in any way whatsoever. This chopping of the education ministry into three departments is not in line with any sound management principle", Ms Marième Sakho Dansohko, the Coordinator of the "Intersyndicale", a large coalition of teachers trade unions said.

According to Mrs Dansokho, the government is going the opposite way from earlier recommendations which pleaded for a reunion of all the education sectors to be under one ministry, for "coherence" purposes.

On June 1, the president met the trade-unions and asked them to stop the work stoppage to save the academic year, which since October has suffered from several strikes both by teachers and students.

The unions are not the only ones who have criticised the government decision to split the Education ministry.

The general public and some newspapers have also expressed concern at the increasing number of government portfolios at a time when people are demanding the government reduce its expenses.

Before he reshuffled his government, the president threatened to withhold the salaries for those teachers who continue to go on strike.

"I cannot pay somebody who is not going to work", the president said on Sunday while speaking to a gathering of his supporters.

Copyright © 2008 The Nation. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com).

Interesting Quote

“We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better. “

So said Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling as she delivered a moving commencement speech at Harvard University, focusing on failure and the power of imagination.


"If you choose to use your status and influence to raise your voice on behalf of those who have no voice; if you choose to identify not only with the powerful, but with the powerless; if you retain the ability to imagine yourself into the lives of those who do not have your advantages, then it will not only be your proud families who celebrate your existence, but thousands and millions of people whose reality you have helped transform for the better. We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better."



I'm not sure where Ms. Rowling is in her faith, but I believe these are some pretty powerful statements. And as a believer, the power is Jesus Christ.
Can I get an amen?

ATROCITIES BEYOND WORDS

Where's the Church?



AN ARTICLE FROM ECONOMIST.COM
____________

ATROCITIES BEYOND WORDS
May 1st 2008


A barbarous campaign of rape

EVERYTHING in the Democratic Republic of Congo, a country almost the size of western Europe, is on a scarcely imaginable scale--including the violence. Among the beautiful mountain vistas, terraced hillsides and lush tropical greens of eastern Congo, a bitter, decade-long civil war that officially ended in the rest of the country in 2003, and that has claimed several million lives as a result of fighting and disease, burns on in the eastern border provinces of Ituri, North Kivu and South Kivu. A ceasefire signed in the town of Goma in January between the government and more than a score of militias has so far done little to ease the plight of civilians in the east. All sides--government troops, says the United Nations, as well as the militias--continue to use rape as a weapon of war on a barbarous scale.

Most victims, as ever, are women and girls, some no more than toddlers, though men and boys have sometimes been targeted too. Local aid workers and UN reports tell of gang rapes, leaving victims with appalling physical and psychological injuries; rapes committed in front of families or whole communities; male relatives forced at gunpoint to rape their own daughters, mothers or sisters; women used as sex slaves forced to eat excrement or the flesh of murdered relatives. Some women victims have themselves been murdered by bullets fired from a gun barrel shoved into their vagina. Some men, says a worker for the UN's Children's Fund (Unicef), have been forced to simulate having sex in holes dug in the ground, with razor blades stuck inside.


Sometimes the motive is revenge for attacks by rival militias, sometimes it is ethnic cleansing and on other occasions an effort to undermine the morale of the enemy by spreading shame, injury and disease. The trauma and appalling injury suffered by women and men who survive such assaults cripple families and whole villages. In eastern Congo up to 80% of reported fistula cases in women are thought to result from rape attacks. The epidemic of violence also spreads HIV/AIDS.

According to a report published in October by the UN secretary-general in an effort to get governments to do more to protect civilians caught up in this and other conflicts, in the first six months of 2007 there were 4,500 cases of sexual violence reported in South Kivu alone. As a rule of thumb in such situations, says the UN, for every rape that is reported, as many as ten or 20 cases may go unreported.

Rape in warfare is nothing new. Congo has long had a culture of violence and an almost non-existent judicial system. Though rape is supposedly illegal, often it is the victim who is shunned. Neither army nor militia commanders seem to see rape as a serious offence and so take no action against their marauding soldiers. Some fighters are said to believe that the rape of a virgin bestows invincibility in combat.
But these are not random acts by misguided or crazed individuals, says the UN; they are a "deliberate attempt to dehumanise and destroy entire communities."

That process is proceeding apace. Since early last year an upsurge in violence has displaced some 550,000 people from their homes and villages in eastern Congo. The sprawling, hellish camps for displaced people that dot the road from Goma north to Rutshuru, their shelters made from branches lashed together, leaves and plastic sheeting, offer little protection. Not even the UN's more than 17,000 blue helmets and military observers, and close to 1,000 police (together its largest peacekeeping operation in the world), can hope to put an end to violence in so vast a region that is barely accessible by road or air.

And the Goma ceasefire? Pressure to observe it would be a start, even though not all armed groups signed up. Among those that did not are Hutu rebels from over the border in Rwanda who helped perpetrate the genocide there in 1994 and caused it to spill over the border into Congo. On April 23rd, 63 international and Congolese NGOs signed an appeal urging the UN to appoint a high-level special adviser on human rights for eastern Congo.

The idea is to help draw world attention to the plight of civilians, whose suffering is at least as extreme as anything witnessed in the better-publicised conflict in Sudan's western region of Darfur. The hope is that outside governments, the African Union, the European Union and the United States may offer political and financial support. Since all UN members have promised to observe a fundamental "responsibility to protect" their citizens from war crimes and crimes against humanity, focusing world attention on such crimes in eastern Congo is perhaps the least outsiders can do.

Internet in the Congo

Satellite Dish



The Lord has much better timing than us - the satellite equipment was found last
We started praying of course! Then we took action - Osee (sounds like José), our chief engineer, immediately rushed to a near town, Butembo, in hopes of finding the pipe. Justin Hubbard immediately called our contacts at the UN and OXFAM (a large NGO in the area). The pipes that the UN and OXFAM had would not work...our only hope is Osee...unfortunately, due to the plane crash in Goma, all of North Kivu shutdown...nothing can be bought in Butembo or our town, Beni! We have to wait but Souleyman has to leave in 4 days...he cannot wait long - our basketball pipes may have to be sacrificed! Since we need to pour concrete for the pipe soon, he gives us tomorrow at 6pm as a deadline - if we do not find a pipe by then, he cuts it...!

Day 3 - Waiting for a pipe & prep time

As we wait we also prepare parts for a tower we will use to share the connection with other ministries in Beni. We also lay the conduit, grounding wire and dig a deep hole for the dish's mounting pipe. And we wait...and wait..and wait...Souleyman is getting antsy and sick...we take him home and give him some cold medicine. Our BBall pipes are saved for one more day :)


Laying the conduit and grounding wire

Day 4 - Pipe!
We continue prepping pieces for the tower, prepping the cement and waiting for the pipe - by now we heard from Osee that he has a pipe but we need it by the end of the day or we have to cut the Basketball pipe. As the day is coming to a close, Osee arrives just in time! Praise God!





Justin was VERY happy to see the pipe!

We quickly put the pipe in the hole and Honore, our humble, beloved academic dean, lays the first stone for the pipe's foundation. We heap stone layers upon cement layers until the pipe is in place and level.

Day 5 - Is the pipe OK?
It stormed that night - Souleymane and I rushed to the school first thing to check on the pipe - it was OK - Praise God!



Day 6 - mounting & pointing the satellite
Now that the concrete had dried enough, we were ready to mount the dish.

UCBC students helping Souleymane and Avuta mount the dish

Souleymane and Avuta quickly called the Internet Service Provider and started pointing the dish towards the satellite. The process can take an entire day...


After one day spent pointing the dish, we still had no internet connection...everything looked good on our end but the Internet Service Provider could not see us...we left that project and continued making the tower for sharing the internet signal.

To be continued!!!

Blessings: Eric

Eric is a short termer for the Congo initiative serving the university with his computer skills.
Eric has skills.

The forgotten sons of Senegal

this is a report from someone in Senegal...that work with the talibe

In Senegal, boys from 5 to 18 years of age are sent to live with a Koranic teacher, who teaches them to read Arabic script and memorize the Koran, the Muslim holy book. A good student with a good teacher should be able to recite the entire Koran at the age of 15. The teachers are supported by the donations that the boys are given as they beg on the street. There are many of these Koranic schools, called daaras, in the city of Dakar. This brings the problem of a huge lack of accountability for the teachers who have been entrusted with the boys, because they are often quite far from the boy's families. The system is often abused in that many boys end up doing nothing but begging for money for their teacher', who may not actually teach them anything. Often there are no provision for the boy's food, clothing or medical care.



We are seeing many boys with various problems every week. We have been able to help provide these boys with breakfast food, medical and dental care. This has been an exciting open door, and we are so thankful that God has built the trust relationships that we currently have with these boys and their teachers. There are now five Koranic teachers who send their sick or injured students to us for help! Please continue to pray for support of this strategic mercy ministry.

-Tad and Jane, Senegal

if you would like to find out more about this ministry or help with donations...please contact me at uwmwestafrica@yahoo.com

A Video Message from Dr. Kasali

Let the Good Times roll

You hear the stories...you know mission trips are challenging...out of your comfort zone.
But you know what? Mission trips can be fun. It's OK to have fun. It's OK to laugh with people and its OK to be laughed at.

Hope you enjoy a couple of moments Sadie and I shared here.

Reports out of the Congo

This is a report i recently got out of DRC...this woman gave her story in video below. She also made a beautiful dress for my wife. Pray that God will restore her.


Also, I hope you heard that one of our students, Seraphine, had a terribly car accident. A pick up knocked here and crashed her left arm. We praise the Lord because it missed her head just centimeters and also the bone was not broken. The whole flesh on the bone was unwrapped. It was hard even for me to see. This afternoon I visited her at hospital. I hope she will be okay. They removed the strings from the wound today and it became even more painful. But I hope now the final healing process has start.
It is amazing to see how supportive students are in all this. Everyday there are 4, 5 to 10 volunteers who come to the hospital to spend the night with her. And the next morning they are all at school. Then two or three stay to be with her. They are doing rotations. And this has been so encouraging for Seraphine and her family. In the beginning her mother would always collapse when she sees her daughter suffer but students stood beside her and the family.

Debate Rages Over Whether Country Faces Famine

Debate Rages Over Whether Country Faces Famine

The Nation (Nairobi)

NEWS
30 April 2008
Posted to the web 30 April 2008

By Hamadou Tidiane Sy
Dakar

"There is no hunger in Senegal and there will be no hunger in Senegal," President Abdoulaye Wade declared at the end of April, annoyed that the main topic of discussion throughout the country is the ongoing food crisis that affects countries worldwide.

Notably, the president made the announcement at a ceremony where he inaugurated a modern farm, a pilot project that will be replicated throughout the country to revive the declining agricultural sector.

The project is among the many plans the government has launched in the past eight years to boost local agricultural production and ensure food security.

So far it has not been able to reach this target, despite several promising announcements. In response to the president's statement, and using strong symbols, thousands of protesters held a peaceful demonstration in Dakar last Saturday, carrying empty rice bags, tomato tins and other foodstuffs to show that they were hungry; the items also served as a "red card", symbolising their desire to see Mr Wade go.

The demonstration, the first by the opposition not to be banned and dispersed by police in three years, was organised by a coalition of opposition youth movements. To fight the government, opposition parties have united under an umbrella organisation, Front Siggil Senegal (FSS) or the Front to Save Senegal. All the main opposition parties' top leadership attended the demonstration.

The protesters made it clear that there is hunger in Senegal, adding that they wanted more food and a lasting solution to the food crisis.

Ever since a demonstration called by a couple of consumer associations to protest against the high cost of living was severely suppressed by police on March 30, the government and the opposition have been engaged in a tough battle of semantics.

Is there hunger or famine in the country or is it simply a "food crisis" similar to what several other countries around the world are experiencing?

What annoyed President Wade was that the March 30 protest was referred to as "hunger riots" by the local and foreign media, and was included in a list of similar events that had taken place, not only in other African countries, but also in other parts of the world.

At stake for the government are two things: its image abroad, and its popularity at home.

For the opposition, it is a matter of proving that the country's current leadership has forgotten its electoral promises. Mr Wade, in particular, had pledged to halve the price of rice if elected president but has only seen the commodity's price reach unprecedented highs since he was voted in eight years ago.

But for the millions of ordinary citizens, the bottom line is that the price of food has shot up beyond their means.

President Wade was elected on the promise that he would improve the living conditions that seriously deteriorated in the '80s and '90s. That means the current situation is a personal matter for Mr Wade and for the past two weeks he has been at various functions defending his position.

On the day the opposition held a demonstration, for instance, President Wade called a meeting of his own party, which quickly became a "popular" rally to launch a harsh offensive against the opposition.

While the private media focused on the protesters, who were demanding the president's resignation and affordable food, state media showed the president questioning the qualifications, abilities and competencies of the main opposition leaders, most of whom supported him in the 2000 election.

"In 2008, we are not in times of disaster as some destabilising groups want to prove. These groups are more interested in taking power than finding solutions to the problems posed by a global trend," the pro-government daily, Le Soleil, wrote in a full-page editorial.

Written in the form of a letter, the editorial ended with a promise of an invitation over lunch, with a plateful of rice, the country's main staple. It reflected the position the government has taken since the crisis started - denying the seriousness of the problem while pointing an accusing finger at "enemies" both inside the country and abroad, who it claims want to jeopardise the current regime's legacy.

Leading the battle

And leading the battle against both internal and external enemies is none other than "General Wade" - as the president referred to himself to mobilise his supporters. "I am an army general who has just started a battle and I urge my soldiers to engage in the war," he told a gathering of young supporters while inviting them to get involved in his many agricultural projects.

However, beyond the mere rhetoric, few believe he is taking the matter seriously, as the opposition has pointed out several times.

Last week, however, these accusations got some indirect backing from a less politically inclined personality. In an article widely circulated in the local media, the World Bank's country director, Madani Tall, pointed out that "food prices in Senegal are 24 per cent above the African average," and are the highest in West Africa, apart from Nigeria and Cape Verde.

"For a country with a port that even supplies landlocked countries, this is an irony worth noting," Mr Tall wrote.

He added: "We need to face facts and take a look at agriculture in particular, which has been neglected in favour of super-protected industries that are not competitive and do not even generate that many jobs," the World Bank executive said, ignoring that his own institution has also been criticised by local civil society activists as being part of the problem and partially responsible for the failure of Senegal's agricultural sector.

Meanwhile, Mr Jacques Diouf, a Senegalese national who is the director of the UN Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO), had some harsh words for Mr Wade, who, while responding to a statement issued by FAO a few days earlier, had alleged that the organisation of using 20 per cent of the aid money it receives from donors for salaries and operational costs.

Mr Diouf strongly denied the allegation. "I don't know where Wade has got his 20 per cent from," he said, adding the Mr Wade would not solve the food crisis by criticising the FAO.

Less than a week after he unveiled his ambitious plan to boost local production, President Wade announced that he has reached a deal with India to import 600,000 tonnes of rice from the Asian country for six years. One private newspaper, Le Quotidien, bluntly asked: "Under such circumstances [importing rice from India] why would a farmer in the Valley [a region in the north] see the need to boost his production?"

Copyright © 2008 The Nation. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com).

If I could only...

Here I am...a little jet lagged and believe it or not happy to be in Senegal....photo courtesy of my daughter...catches me in the real moments...

Ben and Kirsten just got married last year...Ben is a missionary kid (MK) who grew up in Cameroon West Africa and Kirsten was with us last year. I have a feelin this isn't the last time they will visit West Africa and my bet is they will spend some considerable amount of time there one day...

this was Jane's third trip to Senegal. Jane has a heart for the village no smaller than anyone.

Mary's first trip to Senegal. Dave's wife...she's heard the stories...now she experienced them. She was honored with having the name of our friends in the village name their daughter after her.

Dennis first trip to Senegal after other trips to other parts of Africa. Dennis has been appointed by my organization to go to Senegal in the next few years. I believe that Dennis was touched with what God is doing here.

Mama Monica... I wish I could have captured her reunion with her friend in the village...it was like that commercial years ago when two people ran from a distance and happily reunite. Monica proved to us that hugging and crying in this culture is allowed.

Dave's fifth visit to Senegal. Dave and I have had many experiences together, in which most of them have been very rich...except when Dave gets up and starts dancing with the village. I've been paid well to never show those video's :)
Seriously though, Dave's heart for Senegal and people are worn on his sleeve.
Love you Man.

Sadie returned after waiting seven years to return. The village was amazed. This time I will treasure fer sure.

I met Andy at Echo farms over a year ago...he's doing an internship with the local NGO there...I introduced Andy to our village and we are praying that the relationship grows.

Brad...in the green...he's the man. Clean Water and Brad Saltzman are synonymous.


Here's a excerpt from a few team members...


If only I could get on paper all the sights, sounds, smells, and pictures I have whirling around in my head. If only I could write down in vivid color all the memories I have stored in my heart. I think constantly of the faces and the stories that need to be told but mostly I think of the women. Truthfully we in the US know nothing of hard work. I am barely civil in the morning until I have consumed three cups of coffee and these women face monumental struggles everyday just to survive. Pounding millet sometimes before the sun hits the horizon. Hauling buckets and buckets of water up from the well several times a day and all with a baby strapped to her back. Things are very different in Africa. So many struggles are faced each day and yet I look around and I see all the smiling faces. I see contentment in their simple lives. Truthfully I envy them their sense of community, how they care for each other, how they work together, cook together, eat together, sing and dance together. This is true community. As we arrived I saw familiar faces welcoming us once again into their lives. When the day came that we had to leave our friends I saw something I had never seen before in Africa. This year I saw tears. I do admit that most of them were flowing down my face but thinking back to that moment something strikes a chord in me. Before I left on this trip my friend Amy prayed that we would be the hands and feet of Jesus while in Africa. I was there and I believe I saw that prayer answered.
Roog ah fa ha (God is so good).

- Monica

Being with your team was an awesome experience. That was an opportunity to serve villagers through your ministry and see how God is good by touching people in different ways. God used you as a team for serving the villagers and made some friends and as you could notice friendship could be a powerful tool for spreading the Gospel in Senegal. Hope all of you are fine.
May God bless you!

- Comment from one of our translators

You know one of the cool things about leading or co-leading a trip like this is to experience people's reaction to Africa. I pray that all of them react to what God puts on their hearts.
I also pray they never forget.I won't ever forget you guys.

Living Water International

Hey, after hanging with Brad for about a week and hearing about the work LWI does....how bout supporting these guys?

They are doing some incredible things in the world's most deprived areas.

Here's an example of Brad's time in Sierra Leone after he left us in Senegal.

-That's Brad in the middle-
Monday,
We repaired another well in an even denser area/village. The spiritual darkness was overwhelming. The adults and children were totally out of control. The kids drove the workers crazy during the hygiene training. The filth in that place was indescribable.

Tuesday:
The workers had a wonderful time in a Christian community teaching health and hygiene to 17 women. It went great and I think renewed their energy.

We also took the guys on a tour of the streams in 2 different villages. The garbage and pollution in the streams, with latrines right beside them and then all of the people taking baths and I'm sure drinking out of them was horrifying. Somebody asked me if I've ever seen it this bad. I said no, it's probably 4 times worse than Haiti.

It was overwhelming today and all of us were very sad. The malnutrition was so evident it was frightening.

The container of pumps finally arrived at 8:30 pm. We unloaded it and finished at midnight. :)

Wednesday:
At one place we saw twins probably 9 months old that looked emaciated and horrible. They spent some time with the mother, made an ORS solution (re-hydrating solution) for the babies and then encouraged the mother to give it to them. They seemed to immediately take to it, but I had the feeling the mother wasn't going to keep giving it to them. I also heard that her husband had died 2 months ago.
However, we went to a well today that was sponsored by a LWI donor. When they repaired it 3 weeks ago there was a baby there (Ester) that was close to dying. Because they stopped drinking out of the polluted hand dug well and because I believe they taught the mother ORS, that baby looked very healthy and vibrant today. We got great video of the mother telling the story.

I think the things that are different this time are:
1.) The crush of people, the intensity, the smell and the noise (today we were farther out in some villages and it was quite peaceful)
2.) the amount of garbage everywhere is overwhelming. It smells everywhere and when you see any streams, gutters, or runoff areas it is completely filled with garbage and muck and it smells.
(I've seen similar in Haiti slums but this is everywhere in the Freetown area. It would be kinda like in the Houston metropolitan area.)
3.) this is the peak of the dry season so people are forced to go to the streams; but they wash themselves, clothes , seem to dump as much trash in the streams as possible. Just gets worse and worse the further downstream you get.
I've also seen multiple leaking latrines sitting 10-20 feet from these streams.
4.) I am absolutely convinced the worst areas we have seen is a result of evil being completely in charge. (especially in the village with witches that had human waste all over the river bank.) It is basically a picture of a whole country of people who have no hope.
5.) However, the incredible Christians we have spent time with have a great peace about them. All of them suffered greatly in the war but have found peace with God.



Go to Living Water website and if you can help them out....please make a difference in someone's life today!

Living Water International - Providing a Cup of Water In Jesus Name - Drill Missions, Water Missions, Water, Clean Water, Water and the Word, Shallow Water Drilling, Drill Training, LWI

Africa's Sudden Splash of Good News

Africa's Sudden Splash of Good News

By John Prendergast
Sunday, September 23, 2007; B02
Washington Post

As someone who has worked in Africa's worst war zones for the past quarter-century, I usually write about atrocities, tyranny and famine. That's what Americans are used to in articles with Africa datelines: grim tales of a hopeless and devastated continent. But after years of dealing with the likes of Somali gunmen, the Janjaweed militia in Sudan's Darfur region and abducted child soldiers in northern Uganda, I am far more optimistic about Africa's future than I was when I started.

The election of a 53-year-old former insurance executive as president of Sierra Leone last week was the latest sign of progress coming out of the continent. Though there were some isolated incidents of unrest, the democratic swearing-in of Ernest Bai Koroma was contrary to what much of the world has come to expect from Africa.

Far fewer people heard about the transfer of power in Sierra Leone than saw the 2006 movie "Blood Diamond," which depicted the country as overrun with drug-crazed child soldiers linked to diamond-dealing mafias. Years ago, the world heard horrific news reports about a rebel group there that hacked the limbs off civilians to punish them for voting, or stories that al-Qaeda laundered money through local diamond-industry operatives. But when I observed the first round of elections in eastern Sierra Leone last month, it was clear that the country was turning a corner. Through something as wonderfully ordinary as a nonviolent election, I saw a country willing itself a brighter future.

Sierra Leone's turnaround is a grand affirmation of the future of the continent. It's fitting that this country -- and other nations such as Liberia, South Africa, Mozambique and Burundi, which have also made strides toward democracy and peace -- are beginning to tell a story of Africa that is radically different from the conventional wisdom. They are defying both history and outsiders' low expectations for the continent.

Scratch beneath the surface, and you will find hope and self-transformation -- and inspiration.

During the 18th century, Sierra Leone was a major hub in the transatlantic slave trade, and many of the Africans who passed through it ended up in the plantations of South Carolina and Georgia. The British colonized the country before it won its independence in 1961. Just half a decade ago, the nation was embroiled in a brutal civil war.

Last month, I observed the election in the eastern diamond zone of Tongo Fields, an area crawling with political operatives and former child soldiers. Whoever wins at Sierra Leone's polls also wins access to the country's biggest natural resource and prize: diamonds. So before the electoral process unfolded, every conflict indicator was flashing "red alert." The so-called Africa experts of the world were predicting a bloodbath.

Instead, the country got an election run by some of the most conscientious, earnest polling officials I have ever met. We received only one report of a gunshot during the process -- a celebratory shot through our hotel window. The army stayed in its barracks, and the police helped with security. During the elections I observed in August and the runoff earlier this month, a few incidents of unrest were countered by a tidal wave of efforts by Sierra Leone's civil society groups, churches, mosques and government officials to ensure a peaceful outcome.

"It's a brand new day for Sierra Leone," a former child soldier named Elijah told me. All of the ex-combatants whom I met in Tongo Fields and Freetown, the war-scarred capital, insisted that they would never be lured back to a life of war in the bush.

"We fought for nothing," another former child soldier told me. "We are so tired of war. We don't want to be used for fighting and end up with nothing." A third former combatant, speaking to me in the middle of a diamond mine, divulged that he had committed "terrible atrocities" in the bush. "This vote signals the end of jungle justice," he said.

Sierra Leone's renaissance is strikingly similar to that of Liberia, another country written off earlier this decade by the "experts." In "Lord of War," a 2005 movie starring Nicolas Cage, Liberia is shown as "that country which God seemed to have forsaken." Cage's character describes the outskirts of Monrovia, the capital, as "the edge of hell."

But in late 2005, Liberians marched to the polls and elected Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, the first female head of state in Africa. More than 100,000 soldiers have been demobilized as the country works to erase the legacy of more than a quarter-century of violent political upheaval.

I was there for that election, too. The stories of the former child soldiers in Liberia echoed those of Sierra Leone. "We were used, fooled and forced" by the former warlords, a 14-year-old named David told me; now he wanted to get a little land and some capital and start to farm. Other former comrades of his planned to go to school or get job training. The last thing they wanted was to be dragged back to a world where the rule of law is abandoned and the gun speaks loudest of all.

The evidence of transformation goes far beyond Sierra Leone and Liberia. The best-known story of all is South Africa, which up until the early 1990s was ruled by white supremacists. Today, still bathed in the spirit of Nelson Mandela, South Africa is preparing for its fourth democratic election since the fall of apartheid.

In 1994, Hutu radicals armed with machetes committed a terrifyingly swift genocide in Rwanda, slaughtering hundreds of thousands of Tutsis in just 100 days. Today, the country has a significant economic growth rate, and the likelihood of a return to conflict diminishes with each passing year. Neighboring Burundi and southern Sudan -- also ripped apart by genocide and conflicts that have killed millions -- have forged peace deals, laying the ground for development and security.

What I have found in my travels is a new African story, an assertion of rights and responsibilities by people from all walks of life, especially young people. Africans are demanding that their voices be heard -- through the ballot box, through civil society organizations, new media, revitalized political parties, and reformed institutions to provide accountability.

All this provides some key lessons for the newest and biggest crisis on the continent: Darfur and its regional spillovers. First, don't lose hope. (The cases above demonstrate that seemingly intractable problems have solutions.) Second, promote democracy in all its forms. Third, step up peace efforts. (In all the above cases except Rwanda, negotiations played a key role in ending the suffering.) Fourth, protect civilians. The African Union and U.N. troops being deployed in Darfur should fulfill their mandate to protect civilians and support humanitarian operations, or the death rates will continue to mount.

The difference between Darfur and all these other cases is that this time, Americans are not looking away. With the exception of the smaller but still effective anti-apartheid movement to free South Africa in the 1980s and 1990s, the outpouring of American activism urging a more robust U.S. response to Darfur has been unparalleled: the first truly mass-based political movement to confront genocide or civil war in Africa.

Failure in Darfur would probably mean that Americans would once again turn away from a continent trying to shake off its legacies of slavery, colonialism and conflict. But success in Darfur could ensure that a whole generation of newly politically active Americans would redouble their efforts to guarantee that the world's most powerful nation will not stand by during a genocide or deadly war. Darfur, too, will turn around, but how quickly will be determined, in part, by how successful this activist movement becomes, both in the United States and in other countries that hold the keys to a peaceful future.

jp@enoughproject.org

John Prendergast is co-chair of the

Enough Project, an initiative aimed at crimes against humanity, and the co-author, with actor Don Cheadle, of "Not on Our Watch."

Good News- Clean Water on its way

While I'm not sure how this is going to happen yet, I was convinced on this trip that we are moving in the right direction to help with clean water, irrigation of gardens, and training for hygiene in rural villages in Senegal. We were encouraged with our contacts in Senegal and their wiliness to see what we can do.
We had someone from Living Water International travel with us for a few days for recommendations. Here is an example of one report concerning a rural well.

-This hand dug well was in an area that floods during the rainy season. Sometimes the floodwaters cover the well and it has to be dug out again. The well was cemented all of the way to the bottom. The village leaders said the water would be too salty if the well were dug outside the flood plain area. Salt in the water is a huge problem in this area.
-This site could be improved somewhat if a cement cap were created that sealed the well and the Vergnet pumps re-installed, if in fact they were working prior to removal.
However, if the well breaks and there is no one to respond to repair it quickly, then there is strong concern that the villagers would remove the cement cap and revert back to using a rope and bucket.

This well irrigates a small garden. The garden has a fence around it to keep out intruders. in fact a young man was in this little 'hut' and his responsibility is to guard this treasure. I started thinking about this guys life. Here in this little hut this young guy has no TV,I-pod or book to pass the time. just him, the wind, the dust and time.



We are hopeful by years end that we will have something in place to provide some kind of assistance in Senegal that is sustainable,will provide village involvement, and that these works will give the glory to the One who it deserves.

Stay tuned...

Food Crisis ---World Wide

JOIN THE CAMPAIGN TO END POVERTY

Shocking headlines from the past week have left me deeply concerned. The world is in a hunger crisis. In just three years, the price of staple foods like wheat, corn and rice has almost doubled. If we don't do something soon, hundreds of thousands of people face starvation and a hundred million more could fall into deeper poverty. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said, "The rapidly escalating crisis of food availability around the world has reached emergency proportions."

Violent protests have already taken down the government in Haiti. Similar expressions of frustration and fear have broken out in a dozen countries from Cameroon to Uzbekistan, with experts warning that 33 countries are at risk of social upheaval because of rising food prices.

The question is what can we do now?
This summer, the leaders of the eight wealthiest nations (known as the Group of Eight or G8) will gather in Japan to set a global policy agenda. That agenda must include emergency action against hunger and long-term commitments to tackle the causes of this crisis.

Click the link below to send the following petition to President Bush asking him to rally the G8 to end the hunger crisis as part of an aggressive anti-poverty agenda:
http://www.one.org/hungercrisis/o.pl?id=293-3440475-KeErwB&t=2

President Bush,
The soaring cost of staple foods and the resulting hunger crisis has caused riots from Haiti to Bangladesh, threatens hundreds of thousands of people with starvation and could push one hundred million more people deeper into poverty. Please build on your recent commitment by taking immediate action to:
1) Prioritize issues of global poverty, including the world hunger crisis on the agenda of the G8 Summit this July in Japan.
2) At the summit, secure commitments for additional resources for all types of food assistance and increased agricultural productivity in developing countries.
For the world's most vulnerable people, there is no margin for survival. Today in Bangladesh, a 2 kilogram bag of rice costs a poor family half their daily income. If prices keep climbing, they will stop eating.
By clicking this link, you'll add your name to our petition calling on the G8 to take action to break the cycle of hunger.
http://www.one.org/hungercrisis/o.pl?id=293-3440475-KeErwB&t=3
The hunger crisis is a critical part of the anti-poverty agenda we're asking the G8 to take action on. The nations of the G8 need to keep their promise to increase development assistance to poor countries and double aid to Africa. Combined with trade policy changes and support for anti-corruption initiatives, these resources will help poor countries to build better health systems, fight preventable diseases, and achieve education for all. But without solving the hunger crisis, we won't be able to make progress in these other vital areas.
The G8 can start by making sure that the right kinds of food assistance reach people in need even while prices are skyrocketing. Last month, the World Food Program issued an "extraordinary emergency appeal" to donor countries. On Monday, President Bush pledged $200 million on behalf of the United States, which we applaud. This is a step in the right direction, but will not end the crisis. It may not even be enough to keep food programs at their current levels. The G8 should meet this need and must ensure that food assistance providers have the resources and flexibility to be able to buy food in local markets.

The hunger crisis is not going away. Prices will keep rising and more people will go hungry unless we make historic investments to help impoverished countries grow more food. Food assistance needs to be matched with investment in agricultural development to break the cycle of hunger. A comprehensive approach is needed to increase agricultural productivity in poor countries including infrastructure investment, improved technology, and better access to water, seeds, tools and fertilizer.

World Bank President Robert Zoellick estimates that, if left unchecked, global food shortages could set the world back seven years in the fight against extreme poverty and global disease. We must urge our leaders to take action, and call for action from other donor countries, before hunger derails the progress that we've made to end the suffering caused by extreme poverty and global disease.
Thank you,
David Lane, ONE.org
P.S. I wanted to let you know that we've already delivered your PEPFAR petitions to all 100 senators and we'll be in touch soon with updates and more information on how you can take action to support this important legislation.